Archive for the 'Politics' Category

Here are some strategies and arguments Toronto Mayor Rob Ford could submit to the judge for his appeal of his dismissal from office over a conflict of interest conviction:

Submit your argument on city letterhead, that always looks impressive.

Argue that you can’t be convicted of violating a law you never read. Your testimony was very clear that you never read the law or the city council handbook.

Please note Mr. Mayor: You can’t read the law now, people have been very clear that they want you to stop driving and reading.

Stick with your testimony that you thought that a conflict of interest requires two parties to benefit: There’s no one else that’s benefited from you being mayor.

Ask to have the sentence changed from you are no longer the mayor in 14 days instead and don’t serve two more year of your term to you are only the mayor for 14 days over the next two years. It’ll be a little more work, but you can handle it!

If they want to remove you as mayor they first have to go to city hall and prove that you are actually doing the job of mayor. Celebrate with the football team this week.

It’s a streetcar’s fault.

It’s a bike lane’s fault.

Mention that you confused the council handbook with a copy of the Toronto Star, and thus refused to read it.

Suggest that it wasn’t you who did all of this, it was Chris Farley.

At least get your frequent defendant card punched.

If that doesn’t work then you should at the very least ask the judge for your business card and bumper stickers back and uninvited the jude from Fordfest.

I’ve been listening to and reading about the aftermath of the Vancouver riots and I still can’t muster up any sympathy for those outed as suspects in the rampage “by the internet”.

The specific example of Nathan Kotylak is the most interesting at the moment. He appears to have paid the highest cost for his actions so far.

No one should be making threats towards the Kotylak family, no one but the courts can judge his guilt or apply a penalty and I appreciate Nathan’s apology – but I’m still not willing to excuse a teen learning publicly that there a consequences to public violence.

I grant that the violent destruction of [capitalist] property is how some choose to express themselves politically or otherwise. But I’m no fan of violence, and I don’t think it’s a meaningful way to make one’s point.

Black bloc or Canuck bloc individuals engaging in these activities know the consequences of their actions. Their intent not to get caught only mitigates their liability in their own minds; not the victims’, other citizens’ or in the justice system.

People need to learn that committing violence in public and assuming it won’t be made public is like assuming you can swim and not get wet: it’s impossible unless you wear a full body suite!

The Conservative party’s take on Copyright reform, Bill C-32, is working its way through the parliamentary process. The last two copyright reform bills in Canada have died on the order paper, so it’s about time we revisit copyright as the Conservative government looks long in the tooth.

The Bill C-32 Legislative Committee has invited Canadians to share their views. The Committee has set the following parameters, as summarized by Michael Geist:

In order for briefs on Bill C-32 to be considered by the Committee in a timely fashion, the document should be submitted to the Committeeâ€™s mailbox at [email protected] by the end of January, 2011. A brief which is longer than 5 pages should be accompanied by a 1 page executive summary and in any event should not exceed 10 pages in length.

I couldn’t write that much, but I thought I’d take an other opportunity to send my thoughts on the need for an educational take on fair dealing (fair use) that deals with only who has access and not how (dead trees versus electrons) and doesn’t suggest that anyone should help enforce a company’s “digital lock”.

Here’s what I’ve sent to my MP and modified for the committee. I encourage you to send something similar to your member or parlament and perhaps to the committee.

Honourable Ms. Raitt
Member of Parliament for Halton

Dear Ms. Raitt,

I am writing you with respect to Bill C-32, Canada’s copyright reform bill. I want to urge you to help ensure a fair approach to Canadian copyright works used in education and that respects the rights of those who purchase copies of copyrighted works. I would further urge you to ensure that the Canadian government does not create a copyright regime that centres around fundamentally flawed concepts and technologies that create “digital locks”. This type of approach is no more appropriate than when politicians first tried to control access to the printing press. Read more...(459 words, 1 image, estimated 1:50 mins reading time)

The rescue of the Chilean miners has been a great triumph of engineering and the human spirt. Congratulations to the nation of Chile and everyone involved.

What a great story, and what great television. I started watching the first three miners rescued last night and watched a more of the rescues on-line at work.

The images were compelling; the large pulley wheel turning counter-clockwise as the rescue pod went down, clockwise as it hauled someone up. A variety of faces and emotions up top in HD contrasted against the minors below in grainy digital video.

Every 20 minutes the pod showed up at each end of the hole bored to rescue the miners. At the bottom an excited minor either welcomed a rescuer or jumped aboard the rescue pod. Then 20 minutes later there was an emotional reunion with loved ones at the surface – each with its own back story.

The miners have made a pact to share the profits of their story and not to only tell the story starting after the first 17 days – only building the integer. Here’s hoping they make the most of their ordeal and their able to tell their story and benefit from it. Here’s hoping that other miners benefit from a closer look at their safety after this.

For now it felt good to have a disaster end in great news that the whole world could be a part of.

About Matt Clare:

Matt Clare is a Canadian Technologist who is focused on building, deploying and refining the best tools possible for teachers and learners in higher education. Advocate of making all web content accessible by making the creation process easy.